


Upper Hand (Rewrite)

by frumplebump



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Battle City Arc, M/M, Thiefshipping, give first person a chance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2021-02-16 11:28:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21507202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frumplebump/pseuds/frumplebump
Summary: Malik struggles to keep the upper hand in his partnership with Bakura. 2019 rewrite of my 2005 original.
Relationships: Yami Bakura/Malik Ishtar
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	Upper Hand (Rewrite)

**Author's Note:**

> This a reworked version of [a story I originally wrote in 2005](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1727480). In rewriting it, I was trying to get Malik and Bakura more in-character, make their dynamic a little less problematic, and just generally edit it into something that didn’t make me cringe so hard. If you look closely, there may still be a few problems with canon continuity, but I wanted to keep the same scenes I had in my original story. I hope you enjoy, and if you read both versions, I’d be interested to know what you think of my changes.

I crawled out of a hole in the ground teenaged and furious, demanding the world pay back everything that had been taken from me, then fall on its knees at my feet for good measure. My pain was white-hot, superheated and unquenchable. It made me untouchable, and it hid how much I didn’t understand. If I could hurt someone, blind them, cut their strings and let them fall before they got close enough to realize that my cruelty was just my shield, then I would still win. I could still be king. I wanted to swallow the world, and if anyone watched me, I'd make sure they only saw me spitting out the bones.

It was Bakura who looked at me and understood that I was starving.

I had already decided that I would win or I would die, and with stakes like that it didn't matter what I broke along the way. A haphazard deal with a stranger intrigued me; despite his Ring, I didn't doubt that I could discard him easily enough if he proved to be useless. I had nothing to lose, I thought. And then I was watching him as he flipped open a pocket knife and licked the blade, staring at me from beneath his wild white hair and smiling, before gashing his arm. This was part of his plan, somehow, but I was almost too stunned to follow. And then he cackled and threw the knife over his shoulder off the dock, and I was flushing, because that grin and his tongue on that blade and his blood leaking between his fingers and spattered on his cheek...

Bakura looked at my expression and asked, "What's the matter? Can't stand a little blood?"

I shrugged, not trusting my voice.

"Or maybe... does it turn you on?" he asked. I stared as he slowly licked the blood off one finger.

He laughed. "Well, no time for that at the moment, but I'll keep it in mind. Now—" And then he changed himself into this angelic creature that would never have dreamed of cutting himself, much less suck on his own blood-stained fingers while leering at me. "—take me to my friends, please, Namu-kun?"

He was kneeling now, crouched over his bleeding arm. His voice was soft and stripped of its iron self-assurance. He turned enormous brown eyes up to me, tears pooling around the edges—and then he winked, and I shivered before I could catch myself. The transformation was eerie, and the fact that it was a masterful illusion was creepier. I admired his ingenuity at the same time as I wished I could put some space between us, as soon as possible. I already felt all my control slipping into his hands, and that wasn't how it was supposed to be. I wanted to get back to my hideout, with my Rare Hunters and my brother Rishid, where no one questioned who was in charge.

"Please, help me," Bakura said, in the same small, bruised voice, and smirking at me the whole time. He raised his uninjured arm towards me.

"Come on, you can walk on your own until we get close to Yuugi’s friends," I complained.

"That's true. I can't, however, tie a bandage around my own arm." He had reverted to his own voice, although hearing it coming from the broken boy in front of me made my skin crawl.

"What am I supposed to do about that?"

He made me tear off the bottom of his shirt and wrap it around the wound. I tried to avoid making contact with his skin or blood, which made my work sloppy and which Bakura found very amusing. "Are you afraid to touch me?"

"What do I have to be afraid of?" I scoffed.

He chuckled and didn't answer.

* * *

A summons, from the Ring to the Rod, and I knew he was lurking outside, so I went out to meet him. "I’m bored, Malik. The hospital is like a prison."

I didn't ask him how he'd gotten out, because I didn't really care. I was more interested in the way his hair and skin glowed in the streetlights, making his eyes seem black when he looked at me and grinned. His host had a pretty face, but he brought something hard and feral and beautiful to it. "Let's go find something to do," he said.

"What do you mean?" I made sure my voice was cold, not wary.

He shrugged. "I'm going to go walk around and see what I find, or what finds me. I'm tired of lying in a hospital bed."

"Aren't you supposed to be collecting locator cards?"

"I can multitask." He stuffed his hands in his pockets and started walking away. "Come if you want."

"I have better things to do than prowl around the city with you," I said.

Bakura laughed. "Do you?"

I didn't answer, and he turned away and started up the alley again.

I wouldn't let him hear me call "wait for me," even if I could make it sound like a command, but damned if I was going to let him walk away from me. I hurried after him, slowing down when I got close. He didn't comment on my joining him, but I saw him smile to himself.

We walked in silence for a moment before I asked, "Who are you, anyway?"

"It's a long story," he said.

"How do you have a Millennium Item?"

He told me that he was a thief—the Thief King, he styled himself, and just laughed at me when I rolled my eyes—a tomb robber, dead three thousand years, living through the power of the Millennium Items and his possession of his host's body. The way he spoke, low and almost lyrical, with the moon and the streetlights shimmering on his colorless hair and skin, anyone would have believed him. I had been raised in ancient tradition, and I knew first-hand the power of Millennium Items—of course I believed him.

"And what about you?"

I looked at him. "What?"

"Who are you, Malik, in all this?"

"The scion of the Tomb-keepers, and their avenger."

He raised an eyebrow.

"My family has lived underground, guarding the Pharaoh's memories, for thousands of years," I explained. "We're forbidden to have any contact with the outside world—and when the oldest son reaches his tenth birthday, he receives the Initiation—" I stopped. The old rage was rearing up in me as it always did, coupled with a sense of giddiness to be finally telling this to someone who didn't already know, to open the eyes of a stranger to what had happened to my family and me.

"The Initiation?" Bakura repeated.

"The key to the Pharaoh's memories, carved into my back," I said caustically. "Such a great honor."

"Show me."

The interest in his voice made me realize that this was my trump card. "No. Not yet."

"Oh? Are you playing with me?" Bakura stepped close to me and ran a fingertip down my spine, blindly seeking my scars. I shuddered and started to move away, but he gripped my upper arm. "I'm not going to hurt you, Malik," he said, his voice low.

"Maybe I don't want you touching me at all," I snapped, shaking him off my arm.

"Why not?" He leaned in close again, grabbed the chain on my shirt and hauled me against him. I could feel his breath on my shoulder as he began to run the forefinger of his other hand up my waist, slipping under my shirt. "You don't like that?"

I bit my lip to hold back a gasp. His hand kept moving, sliding around to my stomach, up to my chest, his fingers brushing across my nipple. I pushed him away then, and he released me. With a dark chuckle, he said, "I think you really are afraid of me."

I glared at him. "I’ve never been afraid of you."

"Prove it."

"I don't have to prove anything to you." He didn't try to stop me when I walked away without looking back, and I hated myself for half-wishing he would.

* * *

He reappeared the next night. When he tried to maneuver me back against the wall, I shoved him, then stepped forward into his space and grabbed his face between my hands. I had never kissed anyone before, but he didn't seem to care. My mouth had no sooner touched his than I felt his tongue against my lips, and I opened them for him, then kissed back bruising and messy. I clenched a fist in his hair, and when he paused for air, I forced his mouth back to mine. He responded to that by biting my lip sharply and I heard myself moan.

He moved away from my mouth and began biting down my jaw to my neck. I was moaning again as I felt his tongue and teeth on the curve of my shoulder, and even though I hated my desperate noises, I couldn't quite be bothered to stop myself.

When I felt myself starting to get hard, I pulled his head away. "Stop," I said, trying to catch my breath.

"Why?"

"I—"

He caught a strand of my hair between his fingers. "Why keep denying the obvious, Malik?"

"What do you think is so obvious?"

By way of answer, he dropped his other hand to cup the bulge in my pants. I flushed.

"You want this," he said. Smirking, he added, "We can help each other in more ways than one."

I felt his fingers beginning to work my belt buckle and closed my eyes. He leaned in and tongued my cheekbone, tracing the kohl under the edge of my closed eyelid. "You're beautiful, and I want you." He had undone my belt and was working on the button and zipper of my pants. He guided me back against the wall and pressed his leg between mine. "Stop overthinking this, Malik."

"Stop patronizing me—” I gasped when I felt his fingers touch my growing erection. He smiled at my reaction and reached farther to close his hand around me. "I'm not—I'm don't—"

"Yes, you do," he said, covering my lips with his. 

He tugged my pants down and took me in his hand again, stroking slowly as he kissed me. As he pressed his hips against me I could feel his own erection, and that alone made me nearly euphoric with flattered lust. I shuddered, and Bakura leaned back to look at me. Then he grinned and slid down to his knees in front of me and before I registered what was happening, the warmth of his mouth sealed around me. I gasped and arched my back against the wall, plunging my fingers into his hair as he swirled his tongue. He didn't stop, but reached up to untangle my hands before gripping my hips hard. I wanted to keep clawing at his scalp, but instead I dug my nails into the wall behind me, biting my lip to try and keep myself quiet.

It wasn't long before I couldn't hold back anymore. Bakura let me fill his mouth, then turned to spit beside my feet, making sure I was watching. As the receding tremors of my orgasm pulsed through me, I sank down in a heap in front of Bakura. He tilted my chin up and I tasted traces of myself in his mouth when he kissed me then. As he leaned over me and I let my head sink back, I felt furious tears stinging my eyes.

He saw, and rubbed them away with a fingertip. I wanted to break his hand.

"I believe you owe me something," he said. 

I blinked at him. He gestured down at his own arousal.

"Oh. Um..."

"Just touch me, Malik," he murmured. “Think you can _handle_ that?”

I scoffed at his shameless double entendre, but I complied. He settled himself between my legs and leaned back against me. We undid his jeans, and I took him in my hand firmly, as if I could still come out the victor here if I didn't show Bakura any more hesitation. He ran his fingers up and down my thigh as I stroked him, then reached up to grab my hair and pull me down for an awkward, teeth-sharp kiss. His breathing grew rougher, and finally he put his hand over mine and set a faster pace. In a minute he came, pressing back hard against me. He let his head fall back into the curve of my neck, and we sat like that until we could walk again.

* * *

The final night in Battle City, he had a stolen bottle of imported whiskey, and we passed it back and forth as we wandered the streets. I knew I should be cautious—I only had enough experience with alcohol to know that I hated the queasy feeling of losing control—but that night I wanted to believe that maybe its violent burn would cauterize the raw nerves that ached when Bakura was around.

I realized my mistake when I tripped and the alley shifted, and I found myself with the rough wall at my back and Bakura's hands on either side of my shoulders. “Was this is your plan?” I demanded. “Get me drunk and rape me?" I was dizzy, but I forced myself to keep staring at him.

Bakura chuckled at me, showing his teeth. "Rape's not really my style. If you want it rough, though, I can be accommodating."

"Go to hell," I spat. "You'll never fuck me." I shoved myself away from the wall and stumbled past him, determined not to look at him again. Or to think about how much certain parts of me did want him to fuck me, right now, up against that wall.

He waited a moment, then followed after me, catching my arm as I almost lost my footing again. "Malik," he said. He was standing still, his hand locked around my arm, forcing me to stop and look at him. As I turned to him he touched the side of my face, played with my earring. "What's it going to take?"

"Huh?" I asked stupidly.

He just shook his head and kissed me. I knew, even drunk, that he was making a point of being gentle. And it enraged me, but in spite of that I just hung there in his arms. It really wouldn't take much—

But then he broke away and said, "I think you should go home." I stared at him. "Come on."

* * *

In the aftermath of Bakura's loss to the Pharaoh on the Battle Ship, I retreated to my assigned room to fume. This was why alliances were garbage, why I should have just gutted Bakura and dumped him off the pier when we first met. I'd compromised myself and gotten nothing from it except a useless, infuriating partner who was lying half-conscious in a sick bay.

Except he wasn't. I tensed as I felt the magnetic thrum of the Rod responding to his Ring, and knew he was standing outside my room. I crossed my arms and stayed on my bed.

"Malik," he said from the other side of the door. "I can pick this lock in less than a minute. Just let me come in."

I waited a few seconds before getting up and going to the door. "Aren't you supposed to be on bedrest or something? That was quite a hit you took earlier."

"My, aren't we bitter," he commented.

"You fucked up my plan! We would have won that duel!"

"'We'?" He smiled coldly at me as he came into the room and shut the door. "I believe it was me dueling, and my host body that was at stake. You would be a lot more pissed off if the Pharaoh had damaged or killed my host."

"Like hell I would. I don't need you." I turned and strode over to the window.

"Then why give me back the Ring?"

"Better you have it than me," I said with a shrug. "I don't want that pathetic artifact."

He just chuckled. As I glared at him, he crossed the room and went to sit on my bed.

"What are you doing here, anyway?" I demanded.

"Got bored," he said.

I snorted.

"Come here, Malik."

I ignored him. 

"Malik, before long, you're going to defeat the Pharaoh, I'm going to have the Millennium Items, and our deal will be ended and you'll never see me again."

"I can't wait," I said.

"You'll be sorry.” His face twisted into a filthy grin. "When you're on your own again, and thinking of me while you touch yourself, then you'll really wish you knew what it felt like to have me in—"

"Oh, fuck you, Bakura!" I stepped over to him, ready to hit him. "You really think I'm just dying to take it up the ass from you? You—" My voice hitched, and sick frustration burned the corners of my eyes.

"Malik," Bakura said. He took each of my wrists in his hands and held them gently. I stared down at a spot past his right leg, refusing to look at him.

"Go give your host a wet dream or something."

He laughed and tugged my wrists, coaxing me onto his lap. "I don't want him. I want you." He kept pulling on my wrists, and finally I gave in and straddled his lap. He just held my stare, waiting. I bent down to meet his mouth, and he put both arms around my shoulders and leaned backwards, pulling me down on top of him and forcing me to catch myself on my forearms. I deepened the kiss, feeling myself already starting to get hard. Pathetic.

He moved his hands from my shoulders to slide them across my chest and stomach, up my arms, down my spine and over the scars. His fingertips were feather-light, insultingly gentle as they skated across my back. I wanted to despise the feeling of his skin on mine but instead I was melting into it.

"Fine," I whispered against his lips. "You win. Do it." I moved off him and lay next to him, crossing my arms behind my head and staring up at the ceiling.

I felt Bakura roll onto his side to look at me. He traced my lips with his thumb. "Tell me you want it."

"Fuck off."

His hand snaked down my torso to the waistband of my pants, and he worked his fingers into my underwear to tease the base of my erection. "Tell me you want it," he repeated, withdrawing his hand, "or I walk away."

"Fine, gods, I want it," I snapped, hating the flush that scorched my cheeks.

"That's better." He sat up to pull his shirt over his head.

"Just hurry the fuck up, you smug bastard."

Bakura grinned at me, all teeth, as he unfastened my pants and slid them off my legs, tossing them to the floor. Then he did the same with his own jeans, first getting a small bottle out of his pocket.

"That's disgusting," I said, when I realized it was lube. I had fallen so neatly into the plans he had laid.

He chuckled. "You'd be sorry if I didn't have it," he said.

Bakura ran his hand up my thigh to my ass. He leaned over me and kissed me just as he began to slide a cold finger into me, so that my sharp curse was lost in his mouth. I grabbed handfuls of his hair as he worked his finger in me, added a second.

He spread my legs and settled between my knees as he coated himself with the lube, and I stared up at him, waiting. I didn't know what to do with my hands, and it pissed me off that I was thinking about something so stupid.

Then he pressed into me with a sigh, filling me slowly but relentlessly, and my hands flew up to grab his shoulders, my nails digging into his flesh. "Shit," I hissed, hoping I would break his skin and make him bleed for this.

"Mmm," he murmured. "It gets better." He started to move, shallow and languid at first, then more purposefully. The pain was ebbing away, but it still wasn't doing much for me—and then he shifted into just the right angle and I saw stars.

"Oh, _shit_ ," I said again, in an entirely different tone of voice. I arched my back and wrapped my legs around his waist, fighting his movements as I tried to demand more of that.

He gave it to me, holding my gaze the whole time. He braced himself on one arm so that he could touch me, until I came to my senses and knocked his hand away. When I started stroking myself, desperate and distracted, Bakura laughed under his breath, as if he knew how much I'd rather have his hand on me, taking me completely apart. I ached gloriously, shame and pleasure and desire swelling thick and heavy in me until I couldn't take any more and clenched my eyes shut and came all over my stomach and his. At that, he finally closed his own eyes, and came almost immediately, collapsing on top of me. I let my arms rest on his shoulders. He was crushing the air out of me and his breath tickled my damp skin but instead of doing anything about it, I started lazily watching my fingers comb through his hair like they belonged to someone else. When he shifted and murmured, I felt almost content.

Content. Something snapped in me. If the screaming urgency in my mind could be so easily sated by something so crude, then what—? As I stared at Bakura’s head resting on my chest, I felt a cold tide of loathing and disgust rising steadily in me. I had just given him the upper hand, utterly and irrevocably. For a little bit of pleasure, I just let him use my body. My _body_!

I could feel the panic surging, crashing hard enough to knock me off my feet. My sense of reason faded away with a little pang of regret, and I felt like I was watching from outside myself as I suddenly tightened my hands in Bakura's hair and lifted his head. "Go away," I said coldly.

"Hm?"

"You heard me. Get out of here." I sat up, forcing him off my body. The warm trickle that oozed down the inside of my thigh made me want to vomit bile.

He just stared at me. "What the hell, Malik?"

As he looked at me I was suddenly humiliated to be naked in front of him. I scrambled off the bed and snatched my clothes. "Fucking get dressed," I growled, throwing his pants at him after I pulled my own on, "and get out."

"What is wrong with you?" He reached out to me and I slapped his hand away.

"Get out!"

He said nothing as he dressed, but when he looked up after pulling his hair out of his shirt, his eyes had darkened dangerously. "Don't fuck with me, Malik," he warned. "You will regret it."

"You'll regret using me like this, you manipulative piece of shit. Now get the fuck out of here and don't ever try that again."

“Using you?” he sneered. “You wanted it. You loved it."

"Go!"

For a moment he didn't move and I wondered if he would actually hit me, or try to use the Ring against me. Then he sighed. "It wasn't my intention to use you. But I won't touch you again, don't worry." And then he left, without looking back.

My mouth filled with sour disappointment at the anticlimax. I wanted to see blood, his or my own, as I stood there staring at the door, breathing heavily, my hands clenched into fists. 

This had been his goal from the beginning—win me over, fuck me senseless, and then have me in the palm of his hand. It was a good plan. It's something I might have done. I had every right to the humiliated fury seething under my skin.

So why was I crying?


End file.
